


Warmth, and the Lack Of It

by beesyruphead



Category: Hooky (Webcomic)
Genre: Angst, M/M, Mutual Pining, There's no explicit sexual content but shit gets fucking HORNY
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-09
Updated: 2019-11-09
Packaged: 2021-01-25 21:36:52
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,827
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21363052
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/beesyruphead/pseuds/beesyruphead
Summary: Damien Wytte has finally managed to ensnare both the heart and body of the love of his life: the clumsy but charming Prince William. Or so he thinks, until he awakens in his bed, the intimacy he'd shared with Will mere moments ago being nothing but a product of his mind. With the two of them spiraling into despair caused by uncertainty, prejudice, and no end to their pain in sight, both Damien and William learn that feeling cold and empty has nothing to do with the temperature.
Relationships: William/Damien Wytte
Comments: 16
Kudos: 193





	Warmth, and the Lack Of It

**Author's Note:**

> I first started writing this at the end of July. I got the urge to puke out a story at like eleven at night, and puke I did. I managed to dish out a little over a thousand words in about an hour or two, and then lost the motivation to finish the piece altogether. Two days ago, I re-read those thousand words, which make up the first third of the fic you're about to read. My old writing, excusing a few grammar mistakes and poor word choices, had aged well. So I decided to finish it. Here it is. Enjoy.

And suddenly, Damien finds himself pinned up against the wall, by none other than his beloved Prince William.

Damien’s breath hitches as he opens his mouth to speak, to repel Will as per usual, to call him an idiot and shove him off although he’s yearned for this moment for years now, but Will is faster than Damien’s words. Their lips meet for a fleeting, blissful moment in a clumsy, heated fashion, setting Damien’s heart as well as the area surrounding his thighs ablaze. 

Will wastes no time in closing the gaps between them. The space separating them is unbearably cold, like a biting, freezing air, and when Will presses his torso to Damien’s the overwhelming warmth is indescribably, absolutely  _ heavenly _ , as though he had been subjected to an eternal winter and the snow had melted at long last. 

And Damien himself is melting. Unknowingly, his breath becomes heavy and his hands find their place on Will’s broad shoulders. Then, Will, in turn, takes firm hold of Damien’s waist, sending shivers spiked with pure electricity throughout Damien’s body, once again the sensation collecting below his waistline.

Up until this point, Damien had been avoiding Will’s eyes and instead focused his gaze on his view of Will’s beautifully defined, muscular build visible even beneath the folds of his shirt. The moment Damien gathers the courage to face upward and their eyes meet, the pair’s breathing becomes unsteady, and, somehow, their eyes speak volumes more than their shaky breaths or their bodies so closely and clumsily entwined.

Without speaking, William inquires, “Can I kiss you again?”

Equally wordless, Damien answers, “Please.”

The kiss is anything but chaste, yet it retains a prevalent sweetness. Having had more of a warning this time around, Damien allows himself to surrender to the hot, wet feeling of Will’s tongue, letting the heat overtake him as soft, muffled moans escape his lips. 

He’s clinging to Will with fabric trapped inside curled fists now, and were he to loosen his grip on Will’s muscular back he feels as though the world itself would meet its end. Both his heart and body’s needs could be forever satisfied right here, he thinks. Everything he’s ever ached for is here in William’s loving arms.

Damien half-gasps, half-moans as the kiss breaks, and finds himself trembling, no doubt due to Will’s big hands that seemingly burn through his clothes, leaving his skin aching and sensitive in their wake. Hell, every inch of Will seems to have this effect, especially now that Damien notices what Will has just pressed up against him.

He shifts the weight in his legs instinctually, but Will steadies Damien’s hips, prompting a startled whimper, then Will slides his hands to rest on Damien’s rear end and pulls him closer with a tight squeeze. Damien then realizes how tight the front of his pants have become. But he ignores that. Rather, he looks up at Will, lips parted, pleading for another one of those kisses that rival even the most intoxicating alcohol.

Having asked, he receives. Damien runs his fingers through Will’s hair, his face growing hot once Will starts grinding against him. He feels like he’ll never get enough of the pure warmth engulfing his entire body, making his head go fuzzy and the wings of the butterflies in his stomach flutter so vigorously. Will is so beautiful and so soothing and so, so  _ warm _ . 

Damien is certain that the moment their eyes meet again, his heart will shatter. Not from pain, but from an overflow. By now, it’s become impossible for him to contain his love for Will, and at long last, he can finally release it all. Years of excruciating pining and tear-filled nights seem so distant and insignificant now, because Damien is here, and he’s with Will, and all that matters is how sweet Will’s kisses taste and how handsome he is and how warm that huge tent in his pants feels.

They’ve been silent apart from the sound of their gasping breaths and Damien’s soft moans. Damien feels like he has to say something. Sure, he would love to keep the kisses going, maybe leaving some below Will’s belt if he were to somehow gather enough courage, but he feels the strong need to confess, despite their impassioned and loving touches surely serving as confessional enough. 

The moment their lips part, Damien rests his hands on Will’s chest, and slowly, nervously, turns up to face him. Damien already expects that when he looks up again, he’ll undoubtedly be overwhelmed by Will’s sheer beauty. He expects his heart to leap into an acrobatic performance and nearly tumble out of his chest. He expects all this, and yet, he is hopelessly, utterly unprepared for it.

He’s thrown completely off guard by Will’s eyes, gentle as the blades of a new spring’s grass under the shade of his dark lashes, eyeing Damien with a desire alight with both a deep lust and an even deeper, gentler tenderness. Will’s face is a flaming red, and he’s sweating, his brow ever so slightly furrowed. After maintaining eye contact for a while, Will’s lips twitch and he looks to the side, his cheeks somehow growing even redder.

_ He’s nervous, too, _ Damien realizes with delight.  _ He’s so damn cute.  _ Then, Damien remembers what he was going to say, after having been distracted by William’s looks.

“W-Will,” Damien manages to choke out in a shaky whisper, realizing that talking is going to be even harder than he thought.

“Oh-- hm?”

“Oh, it’s just…”  _ C’mon, spit it out,  _ he internally urges himself. “I’ve been… I’ve been wanting to do this forever…”  _ ‘Forever’ might be an understatement… _

To Damien’s surprise, Will leans in for another, briefer kiss. After pulling away, he simply replies in that deep, honey-sweet voice, “Me too.” Then, Will leans into Damien, taking care to add additional pressure to their lower halves. But Damien, expecting a sudden rush of ecstasy and warmth, shockingly feels nothing. Perhaps Will just hadn’t rubbed against him in quite the right spot. 

“I’ve been wanting to tell you…” Will continues, putting even more of his weight on Damien. But, somehow, Will feels lighter than before, and Damien can’t feel the heat of his skin like he had earlier. Surely his head has just gone fuzzy from the intensity of the situation. Damien dismisses the lack of sensation once more.

“Tell me what…?” he whispers back.

“Tell you that…” Will begins to leave kisses up and down Damien’s neck. Damien tenses up in anticipation, expecting the warmth of Will’s lips to flood his entire body. He’s met with nothing. Damien is now properly perturbed, but speaks not, avoiding spoiling the mood. Even if, for some worrisome reason, he can’t receive physical warmth from Will, the swelling he feels in his heart should suffice.

“...I think you’re irresistible,” Will whispers into Damien’s neck in between kisses, his voice breathy and low. Damien swoons, sighing deeply, the physical numbness now overpowered by a wonderful happiness.

“I think you’re so cute, even when you’re all grouchy.” If Damien could still feel William pressed against him, he’d have noticed that his prince was reaching for his belt. “I think you…” Will’s voice trails off as he once again begins showering Damien’s neck with undetectable kisses.

“Tell me more,” Damien purrs, his eyelids lowering, holding on even tighter to a muscular back that he can't feel even in the slightest.

“I think you’ve overslept,” Will states plainly.

Damien’s eyes flutter open. “What?”

Then, painfully and abruptly, to Damien’s dismay, the dream reaches its conclusion.

/

For Damien that night, luck is all but a lady. Had the universe been more merciful, maybe Damien would’ve awoken well-rested in the morning to the sound of songbirds, the sunlight trickling in through his bedroom window and warming his pillow, with a beautiful view of the gardens below to greet him when he rose.

Rather, the first sound he hears is the shrieking of the wind and the rattling of the window as small hailstones batter its panes. Due to his sudden awakening, he has a splitting headache, and even if there wasn’t a storm raging outside, Damien’s window is positioned so that he only has a clear view of the stables, which are locked up anyway. He had gone to bed at eleven. It’s now one in the morning, but Damien doesn’t need a clock to know that. His pained head and weakened limbs have already made this crystal clear. And in Damien’s room, it is absolutely freezing.

Half-awake and aware of it, Damien figures he can at least attempt to fall back to sleep, despite the tantrum Mother Nature is throwing right outside his bedroom walls. He hasn’t slept properly since he was young, and has consequently overexerted himself doing magic, working, or studying at unholy hours of the night. Right now, though, he’s way too annoyed and drained to give in to the pain of complete consciousness, and he might have drifted right back to sleep had the cold of the blizzard not bitten him awake.

He draws his blankets around himself in a futile effort to keep warm. The cloth his sheets are comprised of is cheap, and the glass covering his window is thin. The king, despite the young wizard’s value in regards to sorcery and academics, has never considered Damien a priority, due to him practicing magic. It was no surprise he’d ended up in a third-rate servant’s room, but he’d lived in worse conditions, so Damien said nothing. As he shivers in his bed, he tries with all his might not to be bitter. He can’t expect to receive the same treatment as Monica and…

_ ...William. _

The events of the dream return to Damien in a vivid surge of color, emotion, and warmth. An indescribable warmth. The warmth that came with being in love and at last having your love returned, the warmth of the overwhelming happiness captured in that fleeting moment their eyes had met, the warmth of Will’s kisses and his big hands and his strong arms and, and, and--!

_ But it was just a dream, wasn’t it? _

And just like that, the heat disperses. The jaws of the blizzard somehow seem to sink in deeper to Damien’s blankets. 

_ It was just a dream. It wasn’t real. Of course.  _

Of course it was a dream. Its events had been unrealistic. William was never a skilled smooth-talker. Even if his body had the right spirit, his nerves got the better of him. He always eventually buckled under pressure and walked off or said something stupid that killed the mood. If anything, as flustered as he could become sometimes, Damien suspected  _ he  _ would be the one to pin William to the wall and suavely slip his hands down his dear prince charming’s pants when the time came.

_ If  _ the time came. That was the other thing. William was in love with Monica. And engaged to her, for God’s sake. Damien, a slave to guilt (for his involvement with the war and his insensitively sarcastic and critical nature, among other things), wasted no opportunity to internally reprimand himself whenever he yearned for Will, and his internal self-discipline was nothing short of brutal.

_ You are disgraceful,  _ he would scream at himself, his self-hatred echoing off the walls of his head. _ William would be disgusted with you and these thoughts you’re having. How dare you lust after a married man. _

Even so, a voice even deeper within Damien always counters these statements, knowing full well that his love is far from disgraceful, that William would harbor no revulsion for him, that William is not yet married, and that Damien’s feelings are something far deeper and stronger than lust. Damien repeatedly sought to bury this voice as deep inside himself as he could. 

Shivering and alone, Damien can already sense the coming of tears even before he feels his eyes becoming damp. It’s nothing out of the ordinary. He can’t even begin to count how many times he’s cried over Will. 

He buries his face in his pillow, and silently sobs. He’s become very skilled at crying quietly. Even in his younger years living in a different castle, he has always cried frequently, whether it was over an atrocity his family had committed or something insensitive Will had said. Not wanting to be seen as a crybaby, Damien has learned to grit his teeth and excuse himself. His tears are silent and his screams are voiceless. They always have been, and tonight is no different.

As his shivering progressively becomes more violent, Damien realizes that he will not find sleep tonight. At least, not in this bed. 

_ I got maybe two hours of sleep,  _ he thinks to himself sourly.  _ A new record. _

He decides that he could head to the kitchens and scavenge for a snack of sorts, or, if his headache subsides, he could slink into the library for some light reading. Maybe, if time allowed it, he could begin brewing a sleeping draft.  _ Even if I still feel like crap when I wake up, at least, thanks to the potion, I’ll have slept at all,  _ Damien thinks.

Filing through mental repositories of spells and brewing techniques, Damien recalls the ingredients for a simple sleeping potion, one that, if he worked efficiently, should only take about twenty minutes to make. Considering that chamomile is one of the ingredients, Damien sets his sights on the kitchens.

Painfully, Damien slides out of bed and stretches, his aching joints audibly crackling. He feels like an old man. 

The kitchens aren’t far from here, and he doubts any of the cooks will be up at this hour. It’s not like he’s up to anything nefarious, but considering the overall attitude of the castle’s inhabitants towards witches, any staff he encountered would consider Damien suspicious by default, even if all he wants are a few leaves. Just in case, though, he brings his wand, and his bedroom door creaks behind him as he departs.

Damien despises this castle. His life is depressing enough with the threat of the war looming over him, but the suffocating gloominess of the dark hallways and discriminatory guards is unbearable. The glares of hallway sentries are like arrows in his back as Damien hauls himself through the corridors. When he arrives at his destination, even the dark wood of the kitchen doors only seems to rub salt in the wound caused by the somber tone of the night, accentuated by the ghostly cries of the wind. 

Damien needs a break. The footsteps he hears behind him tell him that he won’t be getting one anytime soon.

He inhales sharply, turns around, and finds himself face-to-face with four guardsmen. Judging by their lopsided statures, their red faces, and that revolting stench, these guardsmen have been drinking.  _ That’s right,  _ Damien thinks,  _ The barracks are right next to the kitchens. They must’ve seen me walk by. _

A moment passes, and the guards say nothing. So, Damien turns back around, aiming for the brass handles on the kitchen doors. A large, sweaty hand reaches out, taking a firm hold of his wrist and stopping him.

“Just what do you think you’re doing?” One of the guards speaks in a rough, slurred voice.

Damien cringes. These encounters with the castle staff, especially the soldiers, are not exactly uncommon. Remaining calm, Damien knows they’ll back off as long as he doesn’t provoke them (which will be difficult, given that these guards are drunk out of their minds, and considering that sarcastic insults roll instinctually off of Damien’s sharp tongue.)

“Getting tea leaves,” Damien says, his voice cool and matter-of-fact. It’s not a lie, per se.

“Getting tea leaves, he says,” one of the guards says mockingly, and the others chuckle as the wind lets out another haunting wail. “At this time of night?”

Usually, Damien could lie with ease and get away with it, but right now he’s too tired to conjure up a believable story. Besides, apart from the potion-brewing aspect of it, he can probably speak his intentions truthfully. Unless you’re a fortune teller (and he doubted these guards knew anything about  _ real  _ fortune telling), there’s nothing sinister about chamomile.

“I can’t sleep,” Damien states. “So I’m making myself some tea. That’s all.”

More drunken laughter.

“You expect us to believe that bullshit?” 

Damien is suddenly jerked away from the door by his wrist, his heart plummeting into his stomach. Startled, he looks up and finds himself cornered by the guards. He hears the violent cracking of hailstones against the castle walls.

_ This is so fucking annoying,  _ Damien thinks, anger hissing and bubbling in his stomach. He can’t allow himself to snap quite yet, though. He doesn’t want to make a scene or invite any of these guards’ friends, who would probably be equally as drunk, obnoxious, and odorous. Damien keeps a straight face except for a slight frown, and silently endures the guards’ blabbering.

“We know you’re up to some demonic voodoo shit,” the guard furthest to the back says. “Either that or you’re stealing food like a fucking street urchin.”

“I don’t think tea classifies as voodoo magic,” returns Damien. “And, even if I were getting a light snack, you could hardly consider it stealing. You’re evidently pretty slow, but surely you’ve noticed that I live in the same castle as you, and have access to the kitchens just like anybody else.”

The guard pinning Damien by the wrist pushes him into the wall with a thud. Damien winces in pain as his shoulders meet hard stone, and his nose wrinkles at the stench of the guard’s breath. Damien’s eyes, wide with even colder fury than the blizzard outside, meet the guard’s. Their faces are now inches apart.

“Don’t try to act innocent with us, witch boy,” the guard growls in Damien’s face. “We know you’ve been planning something. You and all your friends in pointy hats. I know you’ve been poisoning the king and bewitching the chambermaids. I see right through you. We all do.”

The guard’s claims were so absurd that had Damien not been filled with rage born of annoyance, he might’ve laughed. These conspiracies, obviously the product of drunken delirium, mean nothing to Damien, but he narrows his eyes and retorts anyway, egged on by his anger.

“The king’s illness is no fault of mine. Perhaps his coughing fits are the result of breathing in the rancid breath of his incompetant sentries that view drinking and harassing passersby as a higher priority than guarding the fucking hallways? His sentries that are, apparently, so stupid that they suspect I’ve been seducing the servants? Do you realize how utterly ridiculous these unfounded statements of yours are? I should pray that--”

“ENOUGH!”

Damien finds himself being shaken and thrown against the wall once more, his shoulders stinging from the guard’s nails which are now digging into the cloth of his shirt. The guard is red as a tomato and furious, breathing heavily. The other three guards begin to advance from behind him. The wind howls. Damien almost wishes he’d kept his mouth shut.

“I’ll say it again: I  _ know  _ what you’re doing,” the guard pants, his voice laced with wrath. “I know poison in a man’s veins when I see it… and those maids, they chitter like birds about you… about the mysterious white-haired wizard who clings to the prince like a fucking leech… raving on and on about you…”

Damien had never once listened in on the servants’ conversations, not caring for gossip. The idea that perhaps a maid or two has an infatuation with him isn’t improbable, but it isn’t like Damien has any interest in women anyway. Secret admirers or not, Damien’s already minimal patience with these guards is wearing extremely thin.

“Ah… but I kind of get why,” the guard’s voice assumes a sort of cruel, melodic tone. The guard raises his right hand and, with no delicacy whatsoever, grasps Damien’s chin and turns his head to the side, studying his icy features. “You’re a real pretty-boy, aren’t you?”

_ Well. That does it. _

Damien, in one swift motion, launches his foot into the guard’s groin and sends him reeling back, screaming in pain. Before the other three have time to react, he reaches into his pants pocket and draws his wand, aiming it at the guard who’d pinned him, and with a skilled twist of his hand and a blinding flash of green light, a small mouse takes the guard’s place.

The other three guards blink stupidly for a moment. Upon the realization of what just occurred sinking into their drunken brains, they all immediately attempt to run down the hall and out of sight, out of danger, out of Damien’s range, but Damien is much too fast for them. He makes quick work of them, and the hallway is suddenly silent. All Damien hears is the wind’s moaning and the clacking of hail, apart from a few squeaks.

Though they try to wriggle out of his grasp, Damien eventually manages to lift all four mice by their tails, and looks them directly in their small, round, fear-stricken eyes. 

“The spell will wear off,” Damien says. “So, don’t bother me again. Or I’ll make your whiskers permanent.” He sets the mice down on the castle floor, and watches them scuttle away like roaches. When they’re out of sight, Damien slumps down against the chocolate wood of the kitchen doors, staring up at the ceiling with empty, tired eyes. 

At this point, he might not even need to brew a sleeping draft. That encounter has left him twice as exhausted as he had been before, and twice as miserable.  _ Fuck chamomile leaves,  _ Damien thinks,  _ I could probably fall asleep right here.  _ There will never be a night he is well rested, it seems. There is no drink for a man in the desert, there is no happiness for a love unrequited, and there is certainly not one moment of relief for a wizard in a land that fears magic.

_ Why can’t all men be like William when they’re drunk?  _ Damien thinks, sighing.

A loud, heavy creak disrupts the droning white noise of the storm as one of the kitchen doors opens.

“...Damien?”

Speak of the devil.

There, appearing absolutely angelic in the golden glow emanating from the kitchen fireplace, stands Prince William. Cradled in one muscular arm sits a bread basket. In his free hand he holds a half-eaten, fluffy, golden-brown loaf. Crumbs line his chin. He’s clad in silky, bright-red pajamas fit for a prince. When Damien fails to speak for a moment, William promptly takes another bite of bread and speaks himself, his speech muffled by his stuffed mouth.

“Wha aw you doinf dawn there?”

_ Oh my god, William, you’re fucking perfect,  _ Damien thinks, his heart leaping off the walls of his ribcage. 

“Um, I was just…” Damien stands up and dusts himself off. He knows he can never play it cool around William. He’s probably going to react embarassingly, and he’s not ready for it. Certainly not after a dream like that. “Getting… some tea leaves.”

William swallows what he’d been chewing. “For what?” he asks, then rips off another chunk of bread with his teeth, crumbs falling like snow from his mouth.

“For tea. What else?” Damien responds coldly, trying not to give William any indication that his heart is performing acrobatics. “What are  _ you  _ doing?”

“Schnacking,” Will replies, his mouth full again. He then looks past Damien and down the hallway, squinting as he does so. When he feels he’s scanned sufficiently, he swallows once more, and says, “I thought I heard somebody yelling. Everything’s fine, right?”

All while William has been staring down the hall, Damien has been doing some staring of his own. Will’s hair is unruly and disheveled, falling on his forehead in auburn tufts. His pajama shirt sleeves are rolled up, revealing large, toned forearms. The top three buttons of his shirt are undone, giving Damien a clear view of William’s upper chest and defined collarbone, which leads his eyes to center on Will’s broad shoulders, then his strong jaw, then his full lips, then his…

“Damien?”

Damien draws back, startled, and looks away, realizing he’d been staring for too long. Much, much too long. Then the self-imposed guilt hits. The wind shrieks again, as if to remind him of his place:  _ You’re William’s friend. Nothing more _ . 

“Ah, sorry, what did you say?”

“I was just asking if everything’s fine,” Will repeats, his free hand reaching into the basket for a chunk of baguette.

“Yeah. Everything’s fine.”

_ No, nothing is fine!  _ Damien’s head explodes at him in a mixture of shame and fear.  _ You shouldn’t be thinking like this, or looking at him like this. He doesn’t love you, as badly as you love him. And he’s engaged! Give it up, you idiot! _

Then, William’s lips, mid-chew, arch in a beautiful smile. He looks like the sun itself, surrounded by the fire’s dancing light behind him, the warmth of the flames seeping through the door and caressing Damien’s cold arms and shoulders, causing his goosebumps to disappear. 

_ I bet his loving embrace is warmer than any fire,  _ Damien sighs internally. He almost wants to hug Will right then and there. He’d nuzzle up against that sculpted chest and rest his hands on Will’s back. He’s sure those silk nightclothes would feel so soft against his skin, and with William’s body heat he’d never need a blanket again, nor a sleeping potion. Damien’s sure he’d just drift right off to a heavenly, peaceful sleep if only William were there beside him. If only…

_ NO! I can’t be thinking like that! This is wrong! I can’t allow myself to fall victim to his masculine wiles. This needs to stop before my heart breaks any further, or before I cross any more lines. _

“Well, I’m off to bed,” Damien says suddenly, summoning all his willpower to turn and walk away from the glowing angel before him.

“Already?” William whines, shattering Damien’s heart into a thousand splinters. “But you just got here! And what about your tea?”

“I can do without it.”  _ But I can’t do without  _ you _ , and that’s exactly the problem here. _

“Damien!”

Damien turns around and finds Will with his hand outstretched. His big, strong, gentle hand…

William, his deep voice tinged with what Damien could only interpret as longing, speaks but one word: 

“Stay.”

Damien feels as though his heart has been impaled with a thousand arrows. His stomach feels unbearably sick, and his lungs seem to have dried up inside him. He feels his face catch fire and his breathing mimics an earthquake, and his throat is filled with rocks. 

He wants to stay. He wants to stay more than anything in the world. He wants to throw himself into William’s arms and kiss him as though it were the last kiss he would ever experience. He wants to slip his slender fingers between the gaps of Will’s own, to stay up till late laughing about absolutely nothing, and laze in the castle gardens all day. He wants to leave Will breathless and shaking in bed, to learn every inch of his strong, beautiful form and take his body to heaven and back. He wants hand holding and stealing kisses in the hallways of this dingy old castle to become commonplace, not something to hide or be ashamed of, or avoid out of fear of being caught.

Damien wants to stay and love his darling Prince William as deeply and as tenderly as possible with all the strength that his beaten, battered heart can muster, because when William’s around, it doesn’t matter where Damien’s been or what he’s seen or what he’s done. All that matters is that William’s smile, the most beautiful smile in the world, never leaves his lips.

Oh, God, Damien wants to stay more than anything on the planet.

_ But I know I can’t. Every second I spend with him, I only fall even more deeply in love with him. A deeper wound, and another disrespectful move towards Monica and their engagement. _

Damien, despite the desperate, screaming protests of his heart, body, and soul, turns away from the prince, and starts walking off. Away from that radiant angel and his sunny smile and honey-dipped voice.

“Goodnight, William,” is all he manages to choke out before the tears start.

/

Prince William, with a full stomach and a buzzing brain, throws himself onto the lavishly thick, soft comforter that spills over the sides of his huge bed. His heavy frame causes the mattress to bounce as he shuffles through layer after layer of expensive blankets and at last pulls them over his head. He can hear the muffled sound of the hailstorm throwing a fit just beyond his windows, which are concealed by carefully draped velvet curtains. His room is dark except for the crackling fire across from his bed.

Everything is perfectly comfortable, and yet, Prince William cannot sleep as his thoughts race ever faster.

_ What a strange encounter I’ve just had,  _ he thinks to himself, bringing his pillow to his chest and squeezing it.  _ I mean, Damien’s definitely strange sometimes, but this was a little weirder than usual. Who gets up at one in the morning to make tea? And changes his mind so suddenly about it? _

Damien, that’s who, apparently. William positioned himself on his back and stared up at the ceiling. Damien had seemed a bit out of it, too. Even when he was tired he was still snappy and sarcastic. Just now he’d seemed more…

_ What’s a good word for it? Passive? No. Submissive? …No. He looked sort of small and defeated. Sad, maybe? Depressed? I mean, he is pretty depressed…  _

Will’s head went on like this for a while, prying apart and analyzing the situation as best he could. Maybe Damien knew Will was in the kitchen and lied that he was getting tea to come see him. Or, perhaps Damien had been in a foul mood and gotten into trouble with some of the castle staff. Maybe he was going nuts and talking to himself. Or maybe…

William remembered the way that Damien had subconsciously, nervously shifted in place as he eyed Will in the doorway. The way that Damien’s small, lean chest had betrayed his heavy breathing with the way it rose and fell, and how his cheeks turned such a beautiful, brilliant shade of pink when Will had made eye contact with him, like rose petals on fresh snow. He had wrung those white, willowy hands and his frozen blue eyes seemed to have melted from the warm, nervous looks he was sending Will. 

_ Did you know your eyelashes flutter a little when you’re nervous?  _ Will had wanted to tell Damien, but decided against it, knowing Damien would do everything in his power to put a stop to such an adorable habit.

A satisfactory word for Damien’s situation at last creeps in to William’s mind:  _ Yearning.  _

Just as quickly as the word had come, William mentally slaps himself across the face.

_ Don’t flatter yourself,  _ he thinks harshly.  _ Damien does care about you, but he isn’t obsessed with you or pining over you or anything, much less in love with you. _

But then, memories of roses and mountaintops and dragons resurface. Memories of a certain kiss.

_ Still! Even then, it’s not like he’s always thinking about you. In fact, I bet he hardly thinks about you at all! He’s got much better things to worry about, like magic, and Dani, and the war. He’d much rather page through all the most boring, ancient tomes in the library than spend an unbearable second pining over you. Why would he waste his time thinking about the least charming prince in the world? A useless prince who will probably make an even more useless king. Nobody could possibly love someone like you that much. Not even your bride-to-be, it seems. _

William wallows in his self-loathing for a good fifteen minutes before he realizes that he’s been up far too late and for far too long tonight. He’ll undoubtedly be very sluggish and even more absent-minded than usual in the morning, and his father will scold him to no end for it. The sooner he gets to sleep, the better.

But he can’t.

His mind is swimming with thoughts of Damien, and he hates himself for it. Damien always slips into his mind, like a cat through a barred castle window. Sooner or later his train of thought always cycles back to Damien’s swan feather hair, softer than the softest cashmere, finer than the finest silk, or his rose pink lips that have always been so tantalizingly close, just barely out of kissing range. Sometimes it’s Damien’s lithe, refined frame, and how his muscles, not bulky but subtle and lean, contract visibly and elegantly beneath all that black fabric he wears… All that fabric Will could only dream of seeing Damien slip out of.

Usually, though, Will thinks of Damien through memories, be they tender, awkward, or painful. Stupid things Damien had said, or the sound of his sweet laughter. Times Damien had criticized him or even insulted him (or both at once.) Or the first time they’d met. William wasn’t too sure about the concept of fate, but if it was real, then their meeting could only have been destiny at work. They were meant to meet, and according to the kiss, they were also meant to…

William buries his burning face under his pillow. He’s always done everything in his power to stifle these feelings that he dares not even name. He’s suffocated them for this long, he can keep doing it. Forever. Now and after his marriage. He doesn’t need Damien. He’ll have Monica to keep him company, won’t he?

_ Monica who doesn’t seem to have any interest in me as a husband. Monica who’s only marrying me for her own purposes and the kingdom’s wellbeing. Monica who I care deeply for, but not in the same way as… _

Will turns onto his back, grits his teeth, and clutches his chest. He needs to go the fuck to sleep. And soon. Somehow, his thoughts involving his future and his self-loathing and that accursedly handsome Damien Wytte seem more frightening than whatever threats his father’s going to yell at him in the morning.

As he waits, and tosses in his bed, and repositions his blankets, and waits some more, and tosses around again, William realizes that he will not find sleep tonight. Not in this room, and not in this bed that somehow feels so bare. So  _ empty. _

There, in his prince’s chamber with its thick walls and shielded windows along with the roaring fire and luxurious blankets and furs piled over his comforter, for some strange reason, William can’t help but shiver, now suddenly feeling so deeply, unbearably cold.

**Author's Note:**

> William in his pajamas, stuffing his face: (:  
Damien: oh god i am just a hole


End file.
